Study details

About the study

The Guilding One Name Study began in 2014. The original effort was to build an accurate family tree going as far as available data allows, but while researching I began to record all instances of the name. Every instance of the name is within scope, whether Guilding is the surname or middle name, no matter the country nor the time frame. Accuracy and completeness is particularly important to me. My approach is to research all reasonable data points for every Guilding as this ensures that with confidence I can paint a picture of them, their family unit, their place in a larger family tree, and most importantly, to resolve duplicates and make corrections (eg. correct Guildings to Gildings).

Variant names

The spelling becomes Gyldinge as you get back to the C17th/C16th.

Name origin

It seems likely that Guilding is a variant of Gilding. I would welcome any etymological research into either spelling.

A number of Guildings have said that Guilding/Gilding is a Norman name, and arrived in Britain in the C11th. I have found no evidence to support this. There could be a connection with the Guise baronets and ultimately the House of Guise, a French noble family. Guildings have been tenant farmers on the Guise estate in Gloucestershire, England, going back to at least the C17th, so it seems possible that Gilding could have became Guilding in order to be more like the French name Guise. I have no evidence to support this theory.